Need those files that iTunes won't give you? Desktop apps to the rescue.

It's a question I'm asked fairly often by Ars readers through e-mail, Facebook, or Twitter—at least two or three times every month. It's also a question I was forced to ask myself recently. I had a number of voicemails on my iPhone that needed to be transferred off and forwarded to the appropriate legal entities. And, equally frustrating, I had older, less-tech-savvy family members facing this problem. It's not as if I could tell them to jailbreak their devices and dig through filesystems.

But as many of my Twitter followers pointed out, there are plenty of software packages that allow users to easily transfer their voicemail files—as well as text messages, photos, music, and other data—from an iOS device to a computer. No jailbreak hanky panky required.

I took a look at the four most popular applications that were recommended to me. One is Mac-only, and three are available for both OS X and Windows (though I did all of my tinkering on a Mac). All four offer free demos for download from their respective websites, though all these demos limit functionality to an extent until you pay full price. These apps work with all iOS devices ever created, including iPod touches, iPads, and iPhones. So which are the best for people who want to retrieve those files from their iOS devices? Here's what I found:

PhoneView from ecamm was the lone Mac-only app in this comparison, though it was recommended to me (by a landslide) more often than any of the others. It's no surprise why: it has probably the most straightforward and easy-to-use interface of the group.

PhoneView, like the others, generally needs to access the iTunes backups made by your device in order to pull the data out. If you encrypt your backups like I do, you may have to enter your encryption password before the software can find your voicemails and other files. But after you do, accessing the files is easy—PhoneView lets you choose between your devices via the pull-down menu at the bottom of the window if you have multiple devices plugged into your computer. Once you do that, you can choose from any of the options along the left to find what you're looking for.

Enlarge/ Voicemail is listed out in reverse chronological order, with phone numbers and names attached.

For my purposes, this was extremely simple. You can select the individual voicemails and listen to them within PhoneView before deciding to transfer them to iTunes or just save them out as .m4a files to your desktop.

The same applies to your call logs (which can be saved out as a text file) and your SMS/iMessage logs (PDF, CSV, text, tab delineated, or XML). And these are just the files you can't normally access from your iPhone. In the event that you've dug up an old iOS device that contains others you never transferred—contacts, music, voice memos, or photos—you can use PhoneView to transfer those, too. Just find the right option on the left-hand side, and the process is fairly straightforward.

PhoneView is well worth the $30 price tag. It's a little more expensive than some of the other options, but I had absolutely no problems when using PhoneView and never found myself confused or frustrated. I would feel very comfortable recommending this to other friends and family, too, whether they're tech-savvy or not. Because it's Mac-only, though, it might not be the best option for Windows-using family members.

iExplorer is the first of the three software packages available for both Mac and Windows, and it's probably my favorite after PhoneView. iExplorer also allows you to choose between different devices connected to your computer, and it looks better than most of the other cross-platform options. Though, as you'll see, the bar is relatively low.

Like PhoneView, iExplorer allows you to automatically transfer music or movies you haven't already moved into iTunes, as well as access things like your contacts, notes, calendar items, call history, photos, and more. And when it comes to extracting things like your voicemail files, the process is again relatively straightforward—the software lists them out and allows you to choose which ones to export to your desktop.

My one major complaint with iExplorer is actually about the demo rather than the full software—you can click around all you want with the demo, but it doesn't make things entirely clear which features are accessible and which ones aren't before you upgrade. Clicking the green "Register Now" button doesn't explicitly list out the features you will gain either, so some functionality may seem like it's not working when instead you just need to pay up. But how would you know that if iExplorer doesn't tell you?

Overall, I felt iExplorer's UI was easy enough to use that I might recommend it to Windows-using family, though I think it's a little less straightforward than PhoneView. The price is also ever-so-slightly higher, but I don't think it's necessarily a dealbreaker if your personal data is at stake.

TouchCopy is another cross-platform solution, and its $25 price tag allows for up to three installs on a Mac or three installs on Windows (just not a mixture of both). This makes it a pretty decent deal if you plan to use the software on multiple machines. But keep in mind that if you do, you're sacrificing some of your sanity when it comes to usability.

TouchCopy doesn't appear to let you choose between devices connected to your computers—it just picks the one it feels like using—so you must make sure to only connect the device you want to retrieve data from. It contains the same basic functionality as the other apps in this comparison: you can retrieve all manner of data from your old iOS devices as long as you authorize the software to access your backups.

Enlarge/ TouchCopy's SMS view looks like it might make sense until you start poking around.

But what I found frustrating was the lack of organization under many of these options. For example, the SMS interface seems functional enough at first, until you realize all the texts are strangely jumbled together with no obvious organization scheme. Even worse is that they seem to be mixed between senders—I found several SMS conversations that claimed to be from one sender when I know for a fact they were actually sent from others.

The same seemed to apply to all the other categories I clicked through. And when it came to retrieving voicemails—my original purpose for finding this software—TouchCopy claimed it couldn't see any, even though my iPhone displayed them and the other software packages could see them. After paying for the software, this was still the case, so it didn't appear to be a limitation of the demo. But on the upside, TouchCopy does seem to make it clear when you're trying to do something the demo won't let you do. For example, you can see a list of your installed apps, but you can't copy them to iTunes or back them up to your Mac unless you pay up.

I wasn't very impressed with TouchCopy—there are numerous ways in which this software could be improved, both in looks and functionality. But it mostly worked, aside from the inability to retrieve my voicemail files. I wouldn't put this at the top of my list, though.

Up front, iBackupBot was hands-down the worst-looking and most confusing of the applications I used. It's also the cheapest—no surprise there, since it mostly looks like an attempt to recreate a Windows file system motif from 1998. Generally, it works that way too.

On the upside, iBackupBot allows you to access the backups from pretty much any device that has ever been connected to your computer. On the downside, the UI makes no sense whatsoever—at least not to the person who just wants to access his or her voicemails or contacts. What are those checkboxes for in that screenshot above? And how are these files organized?

If you do a bit of digging into the folders, you can find an organization structure that's slightly more sane. At first, I thought there was no way to find the voicemail files, but I was eventually able to find them by hitting command+M to get to the "media browser," which allows you to access the camera roll and voice memos.

Enlarge/ Who are these voicemails from? When were they left? How long are they?

Other normal functionality that you might expect out of a Mac app (or any app, really) was not present, such as the ability to close windows with a keyboard command or even by clicking the left-most button at the top of the window. No, in order to close windows that pop up within iBackupBot, you have to click the unlabeled "door closing" icon at the top of the window instead. Otherwise the window floats above everything else regardless of whether you want to focus on another window within the app.

Enlarge/ I haven't used this app in years, but if I wanted the data from it, there it is!

The benefit to iBackupBot, if there is one, is that it makes it easy for the serious tinkerer to access and export data files from every single app you've ever used, or every single thing you've ever tried to do on your iOS device. Need some random .plist files or icons saved to your Mac from your iPhone? Have at it.

I cannot recommend this software to anyone—even experienced Ars readers—in good conscience. It's not that it doesn't work (although it does make me want to tear my eyeballs out), it's the fact you can get much more straightforward, easy-to-use software for practically the same price. And if you're going to go this route, you may as well just go all the way and jailbreak your device for free.

Conclusion

For me, my friends and family, and even my tech-savvy peers, PhoneView and iExplorer are much better deals than something like iBackupBot, even though they cost a bit more. These items save you from UI headaches, and they actually make sense to most of the computer-using population. TouchCopy might be an OK solution, but it's not the best you can get for your money. And if you're in the type of scenario that I'm in, where you just want to transfer a few files in order to pass them onto more important parties, you probably don't want to waste much time sitting at the computer using poorly designed software to do it.

But if you disagree with everything in this piece, that's your choice. If iBackupBot is totally your thing and you have $20 to burn, don't let me stop you. Just make sure to keep that bottle of Advil nearby.

I remember that tweet, and the first thing I thought was, 'Why isn't this native in the iTunes app?' It seems the logical place for it to be. Heck, I can email myself voicemails from my home phone - the supposed 'ancient' tech. I could even download text messages via an interface with my decade old flip-phone. It kind of bugs me that it would cost $30 to download anything from my iPhone.

Wait, you'd actually pay for this functionality? There are free alternatives.

As far as I know, the oddly-named i-funbox does all this, but I haven't checked (and can't right now) for this particular functionality. From my experience (with the Windows version) it allows access to pretty much anything in the phone's filesystem, so I wouldn't be surprised if you can get a voicemails, etc.

For example, I used it just last night to downgrade an app on the missus' iPad - the latest version of something she uses all the time is buggier than its predecessor, and it was pretty simple to pull the old version off my phone and install it on her device. Because we use the one itunes account for purchased stuff, there wasn't any problem in transferring from one device to another.

A few things:It is worth noting that PhoneView (can't speak for the others, don't use them) does NOT require you to be backing up via iTunes. Since iCloud, my backups are "in the cloud", not set to be via iTunes and PhoneView continues to work just fine. A newish feature, however, does allow you to scrounge through the iTunes backups you might have on your computer (came in the last several versions or so).

Also, PhoneView can be a little wonky...when you connect your iPhone, it seems you HAVE to click on the Voicemail (Call Log, Messages, et al) header in order to get PhoneView to START transferring those items to your computer. If you simply connect the device and think they're automagically transferring, you'll be in for a rude awakening. You HAVE to click on something to get the spinners going and a transfer progress bar to appear at the bottom of the pane. And then it will take a few minutes to "refresh". I wish it would do this automagically, just start when I connect the phone.

Otherwise, going to @Crombie's comment...I agree. It is just STUPID that Apple has not included these features in iTunes syncing/iCloud syncing. First off, as Jacqui mentions, the sheer need for LEGAL REASONS is the number one reason I get asked about this. Text messages, calls logs, and voicemails. There are TOO many business industries that need to retain that information for Apple to have not included it. To be fair, Windows Phone is no better; in fact, in WinPhone 7, you can't even GET the texts off the phone (been involved with two legal cases where we had to basically take a Windows phone from the user and say "get another one" in order to preserve texts). But this is clearly a point where Apple could innovate. Further, I don't understand how Apple does not get that --COMMUNICATION-- is what people do, what we want to preserve. We save our mail messages. We can kinda save our iChat messages. Anyone who has used a good CRM or Contact system would appreciate the ability to search back through ALL the communication channels! Sometimes my convos with clients span four or five "channels", including VMs and IM/SMS. I'd like them all in one place, sort of like a Facebook "wall" where I can see threads of conversations I've had with contacts. PhoneView is a piece of the puzzle, but it is not at all integrated. Google Buzz might have been a hot mess, but they clearly had something with the idea of amalgamating communications.

Personally, I'd like to see Apple yank these parts out of iTunes altogether. I'd prefer to see a "pro" level integration of Mail, Chat, and Contacts that provides a "unified" view. Not one app, mind you...well, maybe a NEW "one app". But I don't want to create a rehash of the beast known as iTunes. But I want the ability to individually CRM. A system that could scale to a 10 person workgroup would be revolutionary. (Go try to set up a CRM system for a small workgroup...go ahead...I dare you to try...really! Salesforce.com? Baahaahahaha.) Given that iMessages currently "live" in the cloud, I see no reason why SMS/MMS could not be pushed back up from an iPhone to the cloud and live in the great info repository in the sky. Same with VMs and Call Log. From there, the ability to sync to a Mac client (or view them on the iCloud website) should be trivial. Google basically does this now, if you use Google Voice.

What is odd to me, is how Apple seems to be missing (or maybe they're not, but the press surely is then) how close they are to having a "facebook". They have all the parts: they have your contacts, your texts, your photos, your documents...it just isn't collated in any rational, user-centric way. How long will it take them to figure that out? (Fb has 1B users; how many iCloud iOS users are there?)

I've been using PhoneView for quite some time and I have to say that I've been pretty happy with. Each time that I needed to pull something off the phone, Phone View was there to (easily) save the day.

That said, why the f* do I have to buy extra software to get my stuff off the phone?

I'm puzzled as to how these VoiceMails end up on the iPhone. Is it via VisualVoicemail?

I ask because, like most UK iPhone users, I've never used VisualVoicemail. 5 years after the launch of the iPhone it's still only available on one carrier (O2) and all the other carriers have repeatedly failed to deliver on promises to provide the service.

Here's the Apple support document listing the worldwide VisualVoicemail support - it's really shockingly bad. I notice that, for the UK, EE is listed as having VisualVoicemail, whereas they're only actually promising it for next year (i.e. I'm not holding my breath!).

Given it was heavily touted as a major feature by Jobs at the original launch, I think it's pretty disgraceful that the carriers have been allowed to backslide on this. Apple have managed to prevent carriers from ruining the 'iPhone experience' in many ways, but they've definitely failed in this respect.

I currently have 8 unlistened voicemail messages, the reason being that attempting to navigate the keypad driven menu system puts me into a state of incoherent rage, and renders me unable to actually assimilate the content of the messages.

I have both a PC and a Mac. It is easier to transfer data from my iphone 5 such as contacts with the mac and in most cases, (except for music) i do not require third-party programs to copy files from my iphone to my Mac. This is not true for my PC as I use this when syncing my iphone 5 contacts to my Outlook:

Some perspective is needed here - TouchCopy has a lot of functionality and has proved very popular over the 6 years or so we have been working on it. In fact, TouchCopy was one of the original iPod recovery apps on the market.

You've highlighted a number of issues in some specific areas of functionality ( that we are already working on fixing ) while saying nothing positive about the rest of TouchCopy's abilities that are used on a daily basis by many, happy, customers.

Also, you are using TouchCopy 11. We're due to release TouchCopy 12 shortly which fixes nearly all the points you raised here. If you would have contacted us before writing this hatchet job, we could have provided you with a copy of TouchCopy 12 to use instead.

Wait, you'd actually pay for this functionality? There are free alternatives.

As far as I know, the oddly-named i-funbox does all this, but I haven't checked (and can't right now) for this particular functionality. From my experience (with the Windows version) it allows access to pretty much anything in the phone's filesystem, so I wouldn't be surprised if you can get a voicemails, etc.

For example, I used it just last night to downgrade an app on the missus' iPad - the latest version of something she uses all the time is buggier than its predecessor, and it was pretty simple to pull the old version off my phone and install it on her device. Because we use the one itunes account for purchased stuff, there wasn't any problem in transferring from one device to another.